Aid groups race against time in Haiti January 14, 2010 9:44 a.m. EST
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- NEW: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton calls next 24 hours critical to save lives
- NEW: Haitian airspace opened to charitable organizations
- Port-au-Prince remains without water and power since quake
- Government officials fear death toll might eventually run into the six figures
Watch live reports from Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Anderson Cooper is on the scene for firsthand accounts of the devastation from the earthquake.
Port-au-Prince, Haiti (CNN) -- Countries and aid groups large and small worked Thursday to help survivors in quake-ravaged Haiti in an international effort rivaling the response to the 2004 Asian tsunami.They scrambled to help as people dug furiously to rescue loved ones trapped in the rubble on the streets of Port-au-Prince. International aid groups sought to provide medical care, food and water to tens of thousands after Tuesday's devastating 7.0-magnitude earthquake.
Haitian airspace was opened Thursday to charitable organizations, enabling tons of humanitarian aid to be flown in, a Red Cross official said.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the next 24 hours "critical to save those lives that can be saved" and said the United States was "moving as quickly as possible."
Clinton spoke as the first of 3,500 U.S. Army paratroopers prepared to deploy from Pope Air Force Base in North Carolina to Haiti.
Video: An 'absolutely horrible scene' 
Video: Haitian president among homeless 
Video: Haiti's overrun clinics "Once we can get communications up so we can tell people where to go, what kind of help they can expect, we'll be able to better manage the crisis," Clinton said on CNN's "American Morning."
She said the United States is providing a communications network to shore up the battered Haitian government infrastructure.
Watch as rescue teams gear up for hard work
The quake affected roughly one in three Haitians -- about 3 million people, the Red Cross estimated. It was so strong that it was felt in Cuba, more than 200 miles away.
See CNN's complete coverage of the quake
Precise casualty estimates were impossible to determine. Haitian President Rene Preval said Wednesday he had heard estimates of up to 50,000 dead, but that it was too early to know for sure. The Haitian prime minister said he worries that several hundred thousand people were killed.
And Felix Augustin, the Haitian consul general to the United Nations, said more than 100,000 may have perished.
At least 16 U.N. peacekeepers were killed in the quake, as well as Joseph Serge Miot, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Port-au-Prince.
Search and rescue units geared up to save trapped people in the capital, where the quake pancaked houses and chased others out in the streets, prompting thousands to sleep out in the open on mattresses and cardboard boxes. Rubble-strewn roads, downed trees and a battered communications network hampered humanitarian groups trying to get supplies to victims.
The calamity has overwhelmed doctors. Clinton said Port-au-Prince hospitals have collapsed and the few facilities still open can't handle the needs of the injured. The United States and other countries were dispatching medical supplies, facilities and personnel, and Clinton said that will be a challenge.
"This is a large area involving many, many, many millions of people who have been cut off from access. Just getting to people to provide the medical assistance they need is proving to be very difficult," Clinton said.
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Clinton said the U.S. and other countries' search and rescue teams have begun their work in Port-au-Prince to search for the missing, from residents sandwiched in their homes and to others who are unaccounted for, including some members of the Haitian parliament, the U.N. peacekeeping force and Doctors Without Borders.
The overcrowded national penitentiary in the capital collapsed, and inmates escaped, prompting worries about looting, said Edmond Mulet, the U.N. assistant secretary-general for peacekeeping operations. But Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive said the population has remained relatively calm in the face of the disaster.
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Clinton said the United States is providing security help to the United Nations, which was devastated by the collapse of its headquarters, a peacekeeping and police force established after the 2004 ouster of then-President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
"The authorities that existed before the earthquake are not able to fully function. We'll try to support them as they re-establish authority," Clinton said.
She said a contingent of 2,000 U.S. Marines will help the international peacekeepers who have served as police in Haiti, which doesn't have an army.
"We've got the 82nd Airborne and other military assets coming in. We had a military team reopen the airport so we can start to handle the big heavy planes," she said.
Clinton made her remarks a day after President Obama promised a "swift, coordinated and aggressive" response from the U.S.
The United Nations announced $10 million in aid; the World Bank pledged $100 million. Agencies, celebrities and charities mobilized relief efforts, including the Samaritan's Purse, Islamic Relief USA, Jewish Federations of North America, Salvation Army, Catholic Relief Services, Jolie-Pitt Foundation and musician Wyclef Jean's Yele Foundation.
Watch as U.N. program vows more food aid
Belize, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Cuba, France, Guyana, Israel Iceland, Japan, Morocco, the Netherlands, Russia, Spain and the United Kingdom also offered aid.
Throughout Haiti, the scope of the decimation was apparent.
The bodies and the bleeding covered every inch of a small clinic in Port-au-Prince, the doctors inside overwhelmed with the wounded as they limply lay on floors or leaned on walls in despair.
"We need medicine. We need medical help in general," Preval said. "Some of the hospitals, they collapsed. The hospitals, they are full and they put people in the outside. ... So we need some hospitals, some medicine and some doctors."
Outside the clinic -- and on city sidewalks -- people piled up bodies because there was nowhere to take or bury them.
On one street lay the body of a girl, maybe 5 or 6, covered by part of a cardboard box. On another, a man carted an elderly lady in a wheelbarrow toward a hospital.
In the absence of heavy machinery to clear the debris, residents used their hands and brawn to lift large slabs of concrete. Some trapped victims punched out bricks themselves and tried to squeeze through cracks in the fallen structures.
Watch a heartbreaking tour of the devastation
Rescuers followed the flies. Wherever the insects buzzed meant a survivor or body lay buried underneath.
Near the presidential palace, residents dug for hours to rescue a 13-year-old girl named Bea, who had been trapped in the rubble since Tuesday. A wild cheer went up as she was pulled out alive.
But nearby lay the bodies of four of her family members.
With phone service spotty, residents ran up to reporters and shoved pieces of paper in their hands. They asked reporters to read the notes on air so family members in the United States would know they were alive.
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